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Monday, 28 January 2013

Toydarian Grabworms

Howdy All! Less than a week away from GottaCon, and I'm getting both anxious and excited! Yesterday marked our last session of my Edge of the Empire story arc that I called 'Hunt for the Grabworm'. In preparation for the Con I've been playing as much EotE as I can, running two separate games a week. And with the completion of my Sunday groups' story arc, we're going to take a break from it and play some Deathwatch after the con. Hopefully I won't be too Star Wars'd out afterwards, as I still have two more acts to run in the EotE Beginner Game adventure, The Long Arm of the Hutt, for my other group!On a related note, I got an email from a party attending GottaCon, asking if I could run an additional EotE session they can attend. I'm for the possibility of running another session so emailed the Con heads, but I seemed to miss the deadline for getting a slot. But they suggested we keep and eye out for no-shows, cancellations, or free areas will could play in.Anyway on to the Grabworms!Grabworms were one of my first crafted adversaries in EotE; I wanted to create something interesting and challenging to my players for the finale, so I had them combat a Juvenile and an Elder Adult Grabworm. The wookieepedia entry for them is rather sparse, so I had some freedom to design these creatures. Along with the stat blocks, I wrote up a brief Ecology of them:

Grabworm Ecology

Grabworms are voracious aquatic ambush-predators from Toydaria that use their keen senses and natural camouflage to prey upon the unwary. Juveniles are over 3 meters long and half a meter in diameter on average, and can pose a threat to the indigenous Toydarians, although most Juveniles will only attack prey they can easily swallow whole. A Juvenile will set itself up to ambush prey by swimming to a suitable location underneath an algae mat, and burrowing up through the mat until it's head just breaks the surface. The natural green pigmentation of its hide and seaweed mimicry of its antennae, allow the grabworm to blend in with its surroundings. Using an array of keen senses that include light and motion sensitive eye spots, vibration-perceptive feelers, and olfactory pores, a Juvenile is able to react rapidly to precieved prey, lashing out with its long, blindingly fast prehensile tongue or swallowing it with its toothsome mouth.

Once a Juvenile grows to nearly double its size, it undergoes a brief change when it turns an adult: It's colouration changes to a muddy brown, to better reflect the larger waterways that it now frequents. Too large now in size and weight to be supported by most algae mats, the Adult grabworm abandons the sit-and-wait tactics of juveniles, and actively stalks prey to ambush. The keen senses that Juveniles possess are further heightened in Adulthood, allowing them to detect prey on the surface of algae mats, which they burst through to attack with tooth and tongue. Rumors perist of humongous Elder specimens that have consumed entire Toydarian villages, leaving no survivors. Detractors ask where do such foolish rumors come from if there are no survivors?